By Jack Tiernan: Tyson Fury is already starting his campaign to devalue IBF/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk by remarking today that former IBF cruiserweight champion Steve Cunningham was a better fighter than him.
Few boxing fans would agree with Fury’s opinion that Cunningham was a better fighter than Usyk. When Fury beat Cunningham, he was coming off a loss to Tomasz Adamek and had been twice beaten by Yoan Pablo Hernandez.
Usyk (20-0, 13 KO) could be for WBC champion Fury (32-0-1, 23 KOs) if he successfully defends his title against Derek Chisora this Saturday night on December 3rd at the Tottenham Hotspurs Stadium in London.
Cunningham (30-9-1, 13 KOs) viciously dropped a wreckless Fury with a looping right hand to the head in the second round of their fight in April 2013.
Later in the fight, Fury used his left forearm to hold Cunningham in place while he clubbed him with a right hand to knock him down in the seventh round.
Some fans complained afterward that that was a dirty move on Fury’s part to beat the much smaller and older Cuningham.
“He did have some success, but I think Steve Cunningham was probably a better fighter than Oleksandr Usyk. That’s just my opinion. I think Steve would’ve battered him, actually,” said Tyson Fury to Frank Warren’s Queensbury about his belief that Steve Cunningham was a better fighter at cruiserweight than Oleksandr Usyk.
“I’m still here undefeated fourteen years later. All these people with this Usyk stuff. He only wants what I have just like the rest of the world in boxing.
“They all want what the big GK has. Immortality. I’ve got more knockouts than he’s [Usyk] got fights. I’ve won more belts than he’s got pants in his cupboard. I’ve been in more events than he’s probably got socks as well.
“They’ve got to be interested in me. The big dog, the king, and the emperor doesn’t be interested in the peasants of the division. They’ve got to come to my table. The feast is on me.
“I can invite him to the table to have a feast on me, but whether they turn up or not is entirely up to them.
“Derek Chisora has nothing that I want at all. Zero. I took his virgin record in 2011, and then I gave him a good hiding in the second fight in 2014, and then I’ll almost certainly give him a good hiding on December 3rd.
“To say that he has anything that I want or need, he doesn’t. Neither does any of them. None of these fighters in the division has anything that I would say, ‘I want that.’ I don’t want anything. All bums will get knocked out,” said Fury.